SLN Relaying Krupa from Beijing--Day 1

From SFO-HKG : Very uneventful except that close to 50% of people on the plane were wearing masks because of Swine Flu.. A 12 hour plane journey. Slept through most of it and watched "Yes Man", "Twilight" and "Dostana". Cathay has quite good food on-board, especially if you ask for Indian vegetarian. Had Starbuck's Scone and coffee for breakfast in HKG airport, tasted exactly like in US.
Interesting side facts about HGK, the toilets and sinks are much lower than in US and they even have "sqaut" toilets in the airport.


HKG-PEK: Another uneventful journey aboard Dragon Air for the first 2 hours. After that, a lady on the plane started coughing, sneezing and blowing her nose, prompting whispers and scared looks among the cabin crew. I was 90% convinced we were going to be quarantined and starting planning out how to send the communications out to my professor who can get it touch with people back home and when I will see Aditya again :-) When the plane landed in Beijing, we were not allowed to get off the plane and health workers in masks and goggles and bio hazard suites came and checked everyone's temperatures. Fortunately, no one had a fever and we were allowed to get off. The had temperature sensors in 3 places before we came out of the airport. Picked up my luggage, exchanged some money ( You can buy and sell Yuan only in China ) and took a cab to the hotel. The roads were wery clean, much like the US highways but what impressed me were the rows and rows of newly planted big trees. China spend a Billion US $ planting trees all over beijing before the Olympics and most of my classmates who are from Beijing commented on how different the air quality seemed now compared to 4 years ago.

Came to the hotel, checked in. Found that I locked my suitcase but lost the key, so had to get it cut open. Took a shower and went in search of Vegetarian lunch food. Right next door is a mega mall with shops like Jimmy Choo, Bacarrat, Burberry and Tiffany's. Found a Thai restaurat in there and ordered Red Curry vegetable. Very spicy but very yummy. Drank Mangosteen juice. Tasted quite ok.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mangosteen
Found a grocery store and bought some mangoes and bottled water. Found some strange fruits. Took pictures of them but don't know what they are. Found strange desserts like Frog Oviduct and Bean paste sweet. Did not buy them.

Came back to the hotel at around 4PM. Got to know my roommate by talking nonstop about me till 6PM. Slept at 6PM and woke up at 1AM. Called US and India and went back to bed. Woke up at 6AM the next day.

More details about Day 2 in a separate post.

I can't post from family blog because blogger is blocked in China. Pictures will be uploaded tomorrow.